BellaOnline Forums Relationships Married No Kids Telling people

It's amazing, manderley, how much I have learned, especially since partaking in this forum and learning the experiences of others, about parents' pull for childfree people to have children.

I realize this may be a negative or skeptical outlook on it, but it SO seems right in line with the adage "Misery loves company." THEY locked themselves down with kids for 20+ years, and they either don't understand why we wouldn't or desperately want us to do the same.

There seem to be very few parents, at least in my life, who just leave it alone. Most are at least vehemently curious while some actually have arguments to try to pull me to either breed or share regret. I cherish the few who accept me and my decision.

My DH and I discussed this issue a lot in the early part of 2007, as it seemed like way too many of our friends and family were getting pregnant all at the same time. I think I might have had a breakthrough when first talking to my friend about her unexpected pregnancy....at that point, I started realizing how much I'd HATE to be in her shoes. Then I started Googling things like "women who don't want kids", etc., and I eventually stumbled upon this board. This has been a lifesaver to me, and the posts of so many like-minded people here have helped me examine my thoughts on whether or not to have kids so much better. I don't think DH really knows how much I think about it, and he's more like so many of those guys who seem to want to/talk about having kids due to the whole "it's what you do" feeling, as well as for those Kodak moments, which as we all know, can be few and far between. Throughout the few conversations we had about it over the last few months, I think that he might be embracing a life with me that is unburdened with children. Neither of us was ever that into the idea, but I think we thought that we would, simply b/c that's what people do after they've been married for a few years....at this point, I'm just about 100% CF, and I think DH might be between 75 and 100%, probably still wondering whether I'll change my mind. He said in one of our several conversations that he's with me, for me, and whatever I decide is fine, but of course I worry about him being disappointed. He's a teacher, though, so if ever anyone had an excuse not to have kids, it's him!

I imagine as we get more into our 30s (I'm 29, he's 31), we'll get pestered about it more, but so far, people have been pretty cool with us having been married this long (since 2001) and still no kids. At some point, if the pestering gets to be too much, point-blank, we'll just say, "We're not, and that's that."

Our immediate families just knew - they would have been less surprised had we moved an elephant into the backyard...it was mainly work people, relatives (not immediate family) acquaintances and strangers.
I certainly made no announcements to these groups...I avoided the topic - I found by giving people even a few crumbs, this led to a feeding frenzy....sorry, my business, I have no wish to debate the topic with you.
I hated the patronizing stuff..."keep the door open"..."keep an open mind" and an older colleague (had her only child at 42) once told me a sad story about one of her friends who left it too late...this friend was nursing the colleagues baby and announced sadly, "You're soooo lucky S - if I had my time over again I'd do things differently"...
I think violins being played soulfully in the backyard would have added something to her story - dramatic effect or something...
The thing is...its quite simple: we're all different.
We're not a bunch of lemmings - if I don't want to jump off the cliff but prefer to enjoy the view - the very pleasant view - why should it bother you? Jump away...
To the new members of the Board - welcome and pull up a chair...

So yesterday was V-day. All went well. DH doing well with little to no discomfort. He can be touchy about his privacy, so I'm leaving it up to him to tell who he wants. Right before his appointment we stopped for lunch and ran into one of our closest friends. He fessed up immediately why were not at work, but said friend had one a couple of years ago (after 2 kids) so he asked for advice (frozen peas, movies and junk food).

I don't think we need to make any announcements. I think enough people have assumed where we were going before we made any final decisions. In fact this summer my SIL (his S) said something to the effect of "I know you guys aren't planning on having kids..." It kind of surprised me, since I felt we were still in the decision making process. But after almost 16 years together and almost 40, I guess it may have been a reasonable conclusion to jump to.

I'm interested to see if he says anything to his mom. She's never pushed, but I do think she will be disappointed. She has one grandson, and that will probably be all unless my SIL gets knocked up again. (Let's hope not unless she manages to get into a real relationship. The dad of her son was a loser, psycho and now AWOL - which is for the best but still a difficult situation.)

Our families just think we haven't gotten "lucky" yet. Which is fine with me, saves us a hassle of explaining why we're not having kids. My husband's family is mormon, so children are just apart of the marriage package and my family thinks somewhat along the same lines.

We actually tried to have a baby for about 8 months. Since my husband is in the army and basically never home, trying to have a baby when he is home is not the best idea. We were both so stressed and tired. After 8 months of charting and all that [censored], I noticed we had started to avoid intimacy with each other. We sat down and talked about it and both admitted we didn't want kids, but thought the other one did. Now we're much happier, a little out of place in the military where kids are EVERYWHERE, but much happier with our lives. I honestly think some of these mom's are actually jealous when I get to go wherever I want and they have to drag their kids everywhere.